Chandanotsavam: thousands of devotees throng Simhachalam temple for darshan of deity
Thousands of devotees thronged the temple of Sri Varaha Lakshmi Narasimha Swamy temple at Simhachalam to participate in the biggest annual festival – Chandanotsavam – here on Wednesday, April 30. It is only on this day of the year that devotees can have the 'Nijaroopa darshanam' as the thick sandalwood covering on the idol is removed.
The festivities began with 'Suprabhatam' at 1 a.m. (early hours of Wednesday), followed by Viswaksena puja, Punyavachanam, Ritwikgvaranam, Panchakalavahanam and Chananottaram. Hereditary trustee of the temple P. Ashok Gajapathi Raju and his family members were the first to have darshan, as per the practice at the temple, around 3 a.m. He carried the silk vastrams, had darshan, and presented the silk vastram to the deity in a silver plate. He was received by the priests with temple honours.
Revenue Minister Anagani Satya Prasad presented silk vastrams to the deity on behalf of the State government. Ministers, MPs and MLAs had darshan in the early hours.
The authorities allowed ₹300 ticket holders into ₹1,000 queue lines as there was no other option in view of the wall collapse on devotees in the ₹300 ticket queue line and rescue work was going on. This resulted in chaos till around noon but the situation improved later.
The wall collapse and death of devotees, however, did not hamper darshan of the deity. Though a number of free buses were deployed to ferry passengers to the hilltop and back to the foothill after darshan, they seemed far from adequate as thousands of devotees thronged the temple.
RTC buses were operated from the Gosala Junction (near the petrol bunk) and from the Adavivaram side entry. Devotees had a tough time, in getting a foothold in the buses from the hilltop after darshan.
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